WASHINGTON (AP) — Chief Justice John Roberts issued a defense Tuesday of judicial independence, which he said is under threat from intimidation, disinformation and the prospect of public officials defying court orders.
Roberts laid out his concerns in his annual report on the federal judiciary. It was released after a year where the nation's court system was unusually enmeshed in a closely fought presidential race, with then-Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump assailing the integrity of judges who ruled against him as he faced criminal charges for which he denied wrongdoing.
Trump won the race following a landmark Supreme Court immunity decision penned by Roberts that, along with another high court decision halting efforts to disqualify him from the ballot, removed obstacles to his election.
The immunity decision was criticized by Democrats like President Joe Biden, who later called for term limits and an enforceable ethics code following criticism over undisclosed trips and gifts from wealthy benefactors to some justices.
Roberts, for his part, introduced his letter by recounting a story about King George III stripping colonial judges of lifetime appointments, an order that was “not well received.”
Trump is now readying for a second term as president with an ambitious conservative agenda, elements of which are likely to be legally challenged and end up before the court whose conservative majority includes three justices appointed by Trump during his first term.
Roberts and Trump clashed in 2018 when the chief justice rebuked the president for denouncing a judge who rejected his migrant asylum policy as an “Obama judge.”
In 2020, Roberts criticized comments made by Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer while the Supreme Court was considering a high-profile abortion case.
Roberts didn't mention Trump, Biden or any other specific leader in this year's annual report. Instead, he wrote generally that even if court decisions are unpopular or mark a defeat for a presidential administration, other branches of government must be willing to enforce them to ensure the rule of law.
He pointed to the Brown v. Board of Education decision that desegregated schools in 1954 as one that needed federal enforcement in the face of resistance from southern governors.
“It is not in the nature of judicial work to make everyone happy,” he wrote.
The chief justice also decried elected officials across the political spectrum who have “raised the specter of open disregard for federal court rulings.”
“Attempts to intimidate judges for their rulings in cases are inappropriate and should be vigorously opposed,” he wrote.
While public officials and others have the right to criticize rulings, they should also be aware that their statements can “prompt dangerous reactions by others.”
Threats targeting federal judges have more than tripled over the last decade, according to U.S. Marshals Service statistics. State court judges in Wisconsin and Maryland were killed at their homes in 2022 and 2023, Roberts wrote.
“Violence, intimidation, and defiance directed at judges because of their work undermine our Republic, and are wholly unacceptable,” he wrote.
Roberts also pointed to disinformation about court rulings as a threat to judges’ independence, saying that social media can magnify distortions and even be exploited by “hostile foreign state actors” to exacerbate divisions.
Against a backdrop of those heightened divisions, Americans’ confidence in the country’s judicial system and courts has dropped to a record low of 35%, a Gallup poll found.
FILE - The Supreme Court is pictured, Oct. 7, 2024, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib, File)
PODGORICA, Montenegro (AP) — A top-level meeting in Montenegro on Friday looked for ways to curb illegal weapons after a gunman fatally shot 12 people in a second such tragedy in less than three years in the small Balkan country.
An emergency session of Montenegro's National Security Council is expected to call for a new gun law and urgent actions to confiscate what are believed to be abundant illegal weapons in possession of Montenegro's 620,000 citizens.
The Adriatic Sea nation has a deeply-rooted gun culture. State television broadcaster RTCG reported that Montenegro is sixth in the world when it comes to the number of illegal weapons per capita.
The gunman who killed a dozen people in a shooting rampage in the western town of Cetinje on Wednesday did so with an illegal 9 mm gun. Police have said they found 37 casings at the shooting locations, and more than 80 additional pieces of ammunition in the gunman's possession.
The 45-year-old man, identified as Aco Martinović, eventually shot himself in the head and died shortly after. He is believed to have snapped after a bar brawl, and went home to get his weapon before launching a bloody rampage at several locations late Wednesday afternoon.
Martinović's victims included seven men, three women — among them his sister — and two children, born in 2011 and 2016. Four more people were seriously wounded and remain hospitalized.
Police Commissioner Lazar Šćepanović has described Wednesday’s shooting as “one of the biggest tragedies in the history of Montenegro.”
The shooting has fueled concerns about the level of violence in Montenegrin society, which is politically divided. It also raised questions about the readiness of state institutions to tackle the problems, including gun ownership.
Hundreds of people throughout Montenegro lit candles in silence on Thursday evening in memory of the victims, while also calling for answers as to why the shooting happened. Many were angry at the authorities for not doing more to prevent such tragedies and protests are being planned for the coming days.
Mira Škorić, a retiree from Podgorica, said that “I can’t believe that we failed so much as a society. We failed as people too.”
In a separate massacre in August 2022, an attacker killed 10 people, including two children, before he was shot and killed by a passerby in Cetinje, which is Montenegro’s historic capital located about 30 kilometers (20 miles) northwest of the capital, Podgorica.
The shootings “require a serious examination of the responsibility and preparedness of the security system," the Human Rights Action and Women’s Rights Center groups said in a statement. “What has changed in the security system in Cetinje since 2022?"
Police have said that Martinović’s actions weren't planned and were impossible to predict and prevent, though he had been convicted in the past for violent behavior and illegal weapons possession, and had received psychiatric treatment.
Vesna Pejović, a Cetinje resident who lost her daughter and two grandchildren in the shooting back in 2022, said police had to do more to protect the citizens after the first killing.
“What kind of state and system is this where children are getting killed? Are we at war?” she asked. "Where were the police?”
Jovana Gec and Dušan Stojanović contributed to this report from Belgrade, Serbia.
A view of an empty street, two day after a shooting in Cetinje, 36 kilometers (22 miles) west of Podogrica, Montenegro, Friday, Jan 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Risto Bozovic)
Police officers stand guard at the home of a gunman after a shooting incident, in Cetinje, 36 kilometers (22 miles) west of Podogrica, Montenegro, Thursday, Jan. 2, 2025. (AP Photo/Risto Bozovic)
People light candles for the victims of the yesterday's shooting rampage in Cetinje, in Podogrica, Montenegro, Thursday, Jan. 2, 2025. (AP Photo/Risto Bozovic)
People light candles for the victims of the yesterday's shooting rampage in Cetinje, in Podogrica, Montenegro, Thursday, Jan. 2, 2025. (AP Photo/Risto Bozovic)
A man walks past death notices of victims of a shooting in Cetinje, 36 kilometers (22 miles) west of Podogrica, Montenegro, Friday, Jan 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Risto Bozovic)
People light candles for the victims of the Wednesday's shooting rampage in Cetinje, in Podogrica, Montenegro, Thursday, Jan. 2, 2025. (AP Photo/Risto Bozovic)
